Gladiator
by tehe10293847
Summary: This is a story of a guy. Probably about 19 or so, his life kind of sucks. The only joy in his life is Minecraft. He discovers shocking details of his co-workers, as his life changes forever. Rated T because I think that K is too young, and I'm sure its not M.
1. Chapter 1

Sigh. Another day at work. Another 6 hours of boredom... And for what!? So I can sustain myself? So I can vanish away after work ends, into a word of blocks!? Hmm... I wish life were as simple as it is in Minecraft...

After my coffee and toast, I took the paper and waited outside for my carpool, Linda, to arrive. The paper was simply mundane. Nothing new. Only updates about how bad the wars are, and also how terrible the poverty is...

Linda just arrived. She always seems to be wearing a light blue shirt with darker blue jeans. Her face is homely, and her hair is short brown, with long bangs. With generic, darker skin.

I walk to her car, and she lets me in. "Hey," I say slightly awkwardly.

"What's new?" she sighs.

After a good 3 minutes of silence, I get restless. "So how's the fort holding up?"

Linda just opened her mouth to talk when we arrive, and I think, That was a short ride...

When the receptionist, Lucy, greets me, I try to smile back, but my co-workers always warned me not to look in her bright purple eyes. She's also abnormally tall, and pretty great at lifting stuff and moving them around with her long, strong arms. She has dark chocolate colored skin.

Lucy told me that I was wanted by my boss about a special assignment. Oh goody, more faxing! Fortunately for me, there was no faxing involved; my boss gave me a colorful red flyer and told me to make 24 copies..

When he gave me the flyer, I swore I saw fire in his eyes. Boss Xain has characteristic red- orange hair, and he's also very skinny, almost like he only has a couple bars supporting his head. His arms are stubby, and Xain's suit is red, decorated with a couple over-the-top embers.

When I was walking over to the copy machine, I stole a peek into the rec room. Only Employees of the Month were allowed in there. I saw Jason shooting his heart out, always getting bull's eyes with his darts.

Jason has the palest skin you would ever see. His fingers are long and bony. His breath smells like death. Jason's head is bald, but he always wears a hat. He's a little creepy at first, but when you get to know Jason, he's actually quite nice. He always is one of the Employees of the Month, though Jason doesn't get paid enough. You can always see his ribs showing through underneath his bleached white suit.

I waved and said hi, and Jason waved back, "I see Xain asked you to make those copies." Than almost inaudibly he added, "So today is this day." I gave Jason a weird smile, and walked away.  
When I arrived at the copy machine, I put the red flyer in it, half expecting something to pop out at me. I wonder why THIS is a "special job..." For the first time I read the flyer.

NETHER FORTRESS CAFE NOW OPEN! BETWEEN THE 7 AND THE 77. WE OPEN AT 7:00 ON WEEKDAYS AND 10:15 ON WEEKENDS. CAFE CLOSES AT MIDNIGHT. ONLY NETHER CREATURES SUCH AS BLAZEMEN AND PIGMEN ALLOWED.

****Did that say nether? And what about the pigmen? I've been playing too much Minecraft...

I only had enough time to pull the flyers out of the copy machine when - they attacked.

There was a flash of black as Lucy raced by me. She took the flyers out of my hands, and teleported behind me, hitting me hard on the back of my head. I saw Jason, in the doorway of the rec room. He was holding a bow and shooting arrows, but trying desperately not to hit Lucy. Just then I realized, he wasn't wearing his shirt - in in place of his chest were simply ribs! I looked up at his face for a dangerous second, and it seemed that Jason was smiling. In that same second, pain seeped into my right arm as an arrow sprouted from it. I was awake just in time to see Lucy pull me away, fighting the others off with a sword, and also to hear Xain's maniacal laugh.


	2. Chapter 2

I awoke in a familiar place: Linda's car. I noticed I was in the back seat, and also that I was lying down. When I got up, and tried to seat belt myself, I realized in pain that there was an arrow in my arm. Linda must have heard me, because she looked in the mirror and said,"So I see you've woken up."

"Yeah," I replied, not daring to take my eyes off my impaled arm, "What's happening right now?"

Linda sighed. "Jason, Lucy, and Xain attacked you. Lucy gave you the concussion, and Jason that arrow. I'm pretty sure Xain planned it all." She acted like I should know what she was talking about. "So, now I'm taking you to a safe place."

Shock stupefied me so it took a good 30 seconds to find my words. I decided to start by addressing the word safe,"So where exactly are you taking me? Why were they attacking me? Are they evil? Is Jason a skeleton? Is that a sword?"

"Woah, woah, slow down dude. O.K. so somewhere, yes, yes, yes, and yes." There was a small explosion behind the car. "Shit... Xain caught up with us"

Looking in the rear mirror, Linda swerved, narrowly dodging another explosion. The window broke, as an arrow hit Linda's seat. "And Jason?" I asked. "I think he just shot us!"

"Did he hit you again?"

"No." I unbelted myself and stood up, trying to get a better view of what was happening. Jason and Xain were chasing us. Xain wasn't the usual Xain, as he was really a blazeman! They were both ferociously shooting fireballs and arrows at us, but just narrowly missing. Jason locked eyes with me and notched an arrow. With surprising speed and aim, it hit me in my flank. "Shit!" I grimaced as I fell over and writhed on the floor of the car.

Linda looked back,"What the Nether dude!? Next time can you TRY not to die!?" More arrows rained into the car, shattering the windows. An inch too close, a fireball set the roof on fire, and another one the back wheels.

We were just about to leave the city limits, and enter the wilderness, when a wall started to form in front of us. An enderman-no, an ender woman-appeared from time to time. Linda sped above legal limit, although I wondered why she hadn't earlier. Again with her wonderful swerving skills, Linda narrowly avoided the wall. I weirdly recognised it to be exactly 2 meters tall.

City limits passed, and the pursuers slowed down. We passed into the forest that surrounded the town and drove even faster, right through the DO NOT ENTER sign. I could feel some blocky force drawing me closer, and also saw some blocked trees. More and more appeared as we got deeper into the forest.

For one dangerous second, I looked behind to see that Xain was the only one pursuing us. He shot out 1 last fireball, and Linda yelled,"GET OUT NOW!"

We opened our doors and leaped out. Unfortunately, I couldn't get out fast enough, so fire scorched my left leg. I stumbled, but Linda caught me. "For the love of Notch..." Xain laughed; he thought he'd killed me.

I stumbled, limped, and leaned, only standing because Linda was holding me up, and only awake, because of the adrenaline in my veins. 20 minutes passed, and I was still too dumbfounded to say a thing.

Linda kept on saying stuff like, "How you holding up? How's your side feeling?" or maybe, "Anything that needs explaining?"

My replies were simple, I'd either grunt, clutch my side, or franticly nod, but Linda must have meant the questions to be rhetorical, since she didn't seem to need an answer.

Finally we reached our destination. There was a big mob of people, all surrounding 2 big, clear, arrows chasing one another. Linda called ,"Make way! I have an injured person here!"

Whispers of excitement from the mob sounded, "Is that Linda?" "Wow, it's her!" One person said, 'Make way, I'm a doctor!" He took some pills from seemingly nowhere, and forced them in my mouth."That should make you feel better..." he advised. Just before I passed out, I noticed that he was ... abnormally blocky.


	3. Chapter 3

I awoke lying down. I was almost naked on a bed, and a doctor was trying to pull some arrows out of my arm. Surprisingly, it didn't hurt.

"Good, you're awake!" Linda smiled.

I passively nodded, "Where are we?"

Linda then took a couple seconds to decide what to say. The doctor eyed her cautiously. "Minecraft," she finally exhaled.

I raised my hand in front of my face; it was block-tastic! I then noticed my HUD was an HUD! There were 9 squares, some chicken nuggets, and also 10 hearts. I realized they were jumping and asked, "Regen potion?"

The doctor just finished pulling the first arrow out. It didn't hurt. "Notch Apple."

"Naturally, you'd use your most expensive remedy on a stranger."

"Hrmm, we have a constant supply of them from Notch himself, so I wouldn't be talking if I were you."

Linda broke in, "Constant supply? Why haven't I heard of this!?"

"Doctors only, unless you want to be on Notch's hit list. Anyway, where is this guy from?"

"A city in the real world." I took a second to think, "I don't remember where..."

Linda explained, "The longer you are in Minecraftia, the more you forget the real world. I'd also avoid calling it the real world, because to Minecraftians like us, this is the real world. Try calling it: Earth."

The doctor exhaled,"There, I got the last one out. And as for that burn, you should splash 1 fire resist potion a day on it. For about 7 days."

He handed Linda the bill, and her jaw dropped, "32 iron blocks for a Notch Apple!? One diamond for a splash potion of fire resist... Wow dude, with these bills, you're going to have to learn to support yourself soon."

"You're going to have to explain everything in Minecraftia that isn't in the video game." I sighed in reply.

The doctor chided me, "People of this world also don't know that it's a videogame, so avoid that too. By the looks of it, you're going to have to come back to me again. My name is Dr. Mark."  
"I'm Linda."

"I'm... I'm... I don't know my name... Is it the memory loss?"

"Yes probably..." Linda said, looking out the window and playing out scenarios. She came back to reality."Oh it's getting dark. We should get going to my place. Bye, thank you!"

"Yeah, I hope not to see you again soon!" I said with heavy amounts of sarcasm in my voice when Linda gave me a thud on my back. "You know what I mean..."

Dr. Mark furrowed his brow and nodded, "Yes. I guess so. Too-da-loo." After that, we stalked outside the doctor's house.

"Huh. So we're in Minecraft?" I asked.

"Yeah, it's real and all," Linda gingerly replied.

"I have so many questions! Do you get lag? How do glitches work? Is game code like laws of the universe? Is the whole world like one big server? Is there stuff in here that doesn't work in the video game?"

"No, there are only a couple, yes, not exactly, definitely."

I sighed, "This will definitely need some getting used to, even if I am totally pro at the video game..."

'Shhh! Don't say video game in public!" And then we reached Linda's house-castle-crayon? "Ahh, home sweet home."

"This is a crayon."

"Is it really?" Linda replied as if she'd never seen a crayon in her life. But, surely her house was a big orange crayon. Its head was stuck into the ground, tilted at a perfect 45 degree angle. "They don't call it Pastel City for nothing..."


	4. Chapter 4

Linda's house was amazing. Even if most of the overground part was mankind's worst enemy - stairs - the underground half was amazing. The outside walls were rocky, but dyed orange. The inside had a nice layer of wool which made it super comfortable. The underground had the same concept, for half of Pastel City itself was underground!

Huge underground communities had formed across the whole of Minecraftia, Linda told me, and there were lots of tunnels and caves that a lot of people practically lived in! Linda's job as an artist (duh) had not included going underground too often, but the majority of people (37.2345%) in Mincraftia were miners, so they almost never saw the daylight.

Linda's upstairs was fairly uninteresting as it mainly consisted of storage and a simple kitchen, but most of the activity happened downstairs. She had built a party room, 3 bedrooms, a dining room and also an indoor heated pool!

Linda sat me down in her dining room and began to tell me the story, "So, first thing's first: why did I drag you here? Lucy, Xain, and Jason are the representatives of the three evils of Minecraft, Combat, Destruction, and Cunning.

"The only way to delay the destruction of Earth is to destroy them at their source. Jason represents all the mobs in the Overworld as well as Combat, Xain represents destruction and also the Nether mobs. Finally there is Lucy. She, being the most dangerous, represents Cunning as well as all the endermen in the End, but not the Enderdragon. Xain also isn't in control of the Wither King, but they let them live in their territories. Any questions?"

Terror struck into my eyes. I was dumbfounded and scared. "What's for dinner?"

Linda, sensing that I was eager to change the subject, replied,"Do you prefer chicken, steak, or fish?"

"Chicken please," I replied hollowly, "Can I have some bread with it too?

With a hint of regret in her voice Linda nodded,"1 second please."

We ate dinner silently, the air thick with anxiety. Afterward, Linda showed me to my bed and bid me goodnight. That night, I dreamed.

They were only bad dreams, about 3 of them, and they went like this: I was in the Nether, and I was dizzy. In the distance I hazily saw lava in the formation of E-T-H-A-N. A group of black skeletons with white leather hats came strolling towards me. I instinctively set the floor ablaze and jumped back. As the floor quickly decayed, the skeletons fell to their doom into the lava below. The dream shifted.

I was in a dimly lit room. The walls were made of cobblestone, with some mossy cobble in the mix. I saw some that looked strangely like E-T-H-A-N. Just then, I was ambushed. Some slimes came jumping along surrounding me, daring me to take a step forward. I drew a shiny-blue sword and stabbed one of them. Before the others could move in, I threw it off my sword and against the other. The first one killed the other as they exploded into 6 mini, harmless slimes. I then constantly slashed at the other. It swiftly bounded forward and chewed on my arm. I shook it off and hit the slime with the butt of my sword. The dream changed again.

I was in a small room made of endstone. The walls were covered in paintings, and the ceiling made of glass. When I looked up, there was nothing but a dark sky and a couple stars, spelling out E-T-H-A-N. I stood there for only a couple seconds before the walls started to close in on paintings slowly fell off, and behind them was lava. I saw no other way to get out of that one, so I uselessly clawed at the walls. Just before the lava touched me, I awoke.


	5. Chapter 5

I awoke at about 8 to see Linda in some iron armour. "Hey, nice to see you awake..."

"Is waking up at 8 on a weekend really sleeping in!?" I protested.

"Mye... So today we're going to the caves. We're going mining!" Linda seemed really excited about mining.

Mining has never been my _favorite_ thing to do in Minecraft, but it was pretty cool."Yay..." I tiredly replied.

Linda put a concerned look on her face, "Is this about yesterday? I know all that information can be overwhelming. Especially all at once."

I remembered about our conversation just when she said that. "Erm, well, last night I had a couple of strange dreams... Do dreams normally mean a lot in Minecraftia? Or are they just like dreams on Earth?"

After a couple of seconds Linda finlay said, "I don't suppose you want to talk about them..."

"No." I simply replied.

"OK. Bye..."

"Ethan! Ethan... Ethans my name. I don't remember it from Earth, but I saw it recurring in my dreams."

"OK, Ethan. I'll let you get ready and everything. Here's your fire resist position, and here's some iron armour and some new clothes."

I realized I wasn't wearing a shirt or any pants and hurried off to my room to get dressed. The shirt was a little too baggy, but it fit well enough. The pants were perfect, but Linda hadn't given me any new underwear. When I splashed the potion on my leg, it instantly felt a little better. The feeling increased for a couple minutes and then it stopped. I still had a limp, but I could walk easily. I left and went to the living room to get some food.

I opened up the food chest and ate some bread and milk. I ate a good 3 buckets before I felt fully quenched. I went upstairs and found Linda looking through some chests.

She tossed me some torches, and asked me, 'What type of pickaxe do you want?" She said it with a certain amount of cunning, like she was asking a trick question.

"Uhhh," I thought loudly, "What types of pickaxes do you have?"

"Glad you asked! In the real Minecraftia, we have a pickaxe for every material." She seemed like she wanted me to ask her about them.

"Fire? Flint? Lava? Grass? Smooth stone? Sponge?"

"Anything solid. Lava won't work, and nor will grass." Linda nodded.

I gave it some thought, "Lapis. I want a lapis lazuli one."

"Sure thing." Linda casually tossed me a freshly crafted and enchanted pickaxe. When I caught it sure enough I instantly identified it to be a Lapis Lazuli Pickaxe. It was also enchanted with unbreaking, fortune, and _lava touch._

"Lava touch isn't an enchantment in," I suspiciously looked to both sides " The video game."

"Like I said, there are things here that aren't there. There are a number of new and different enchantments in Minecraftia. You can go to an enchanter to get them specially enchanted. Lava touch, strength in numbers, mega drill, gravity, they are all very common but effective enchantments." Linda somewhat nerdily explained.

"Erm, so what _does_ lava touch do?" I queried.

"I'll leave that for you to figure out! C'mon!" She hastily left, and I sluggishly limped behind her.

When we arrived at the mines, Linda was ready to lead the way. With torch in hand, and pickaxe in the other, she made her way through the dark caves. I hadn't really got a good look at her before, but now she looked really pretty. I like how she swings her pickaxe, and how she bravely holds torches, not caring what's in front of her, but only about the ores that she'll find.

Linda looked back at me and I realized that I was staring at her. "Hey Ethan! Come check this out."

I snapped myself out of my trance and ventured further on. "Yeah, what's up?" My jaw dropped when I saw it. In front of us was an army of mobs, 300 at best, all of them with murder in their eyes. In the back, I saw Jason, this time in his white suit, with his bow in hand. The walls of this room were cobblestone with some mossy cobble. I turned to see Linda running, and I too ran after her.

"That, that was Jason," I said breathlessly,"And a huge army!"

"Yeah, I've never been to this part of the cave before. If we weren't so careful, we could have walked right into them!"

"OK, but for now we should just focus on getting home."

By the time we got home, the tension mellowed down. In my haste of getting away, I tripped a couple of times, and the sleeves of my too big shirt were ripped. We both took our armour off, and I also took my shirt off so Linda could fix it.

"So what do you want to do later today?" I warily queried, somewhat scared of the answer.

"Theres a fight at the arena around 2:00, do you know what time it is?"

Right on time, my stomach growled, "About 1:30. That should give us enough time for lunch after your done with my shirt."

Linda gawked at my timing and checked her clock. Sure enough, I was right. "Wow man, what other times can your body tell?"

"My pancreas knows when Im tired, and my spleen tells me when I'm about to get sick."

For lunch we ate some fish sandwiches, and a little cake for dessert. We left for the arena at 2:26 sharp as Linda lived right next to it. It was a towering building, about 75 x 75 metres I estimated. Linda said it was really 75 x 67. Instead of the expected rainbow, the arena was colored blandly with sandstone and only some purple wool from time to time. All in all, it had a beautiful exterior.

The admission was free, but a wager that said stuff about getting blood in your eyes, or if you accidentally catch the loser's stuff. The interior had an open ceiling, and a sandy floor. Little entrances crowded the walls of the fighting area, and in the entrance to this arena itself was a ladder leading down to a pre-fight place. The top was decorated with grey flags which gave off a red aura.

The fight this time, was 2 people versus 3 skeletons. The skeletons had flaming bows and held flint and steel. One of the skeletons had stiff wooden armour on, and acted like a juggernaut. The 2 people planned accordingly, and wore fire resistance on their leather armour. One person was equipped with a bow, and the other had a shield and battle axe.

The fight began with the axed woman charging at the juggernaut skeleton. The skeletons quickly reacted by rapidly shooting her and burning the ground where she stood. The juggernaut simply stood there careful to avoid the fire as his suit would burn. Meanwhile, the bowed man was firing away at the skeletons in the back, but the juggernaut's massive armour had the magnet enchantment, so he took most of the hits. The few that hit the skeletons hit them hard. Each arrow exploded into 6 others, seeking out another arrow. When 2 met, they would explode in some white dust, dealing harsh damage not to the skeletons, but to the arena itself. Finally, the wooden juggernaut had killed the battle axe wielding girl. The skeleton's only mistake was falling into the fire, and dieing for himself. Now it was a simple bow fight, but the man with the bow was simply outnumbered. He nervously fired his bow, which only appeared to damage the arena when a layer of sand disappeared and made way for lava. The skeletons who already hardly had time to fire an arrow, cried out in pain as they died.

The flags above everything glowed red then changed to blue as Linda's face appeared. A couple of workers with sand in their hands hurriedly but perfectly repaired the floor, and some entrances opened as the fighters walked out, fully in armour, even the ones who died. The crowd gave a standing ovation at the excellent fight. A chest pistoned up from the ground and the girl with the axe opened it and claimed her reward.

I had so many questions on the way home. I asked, "Was that your face? Did the people come to life again? Can I do this? About how much experience do you need to do it? Did you see that guy's bow enchantment? How much money would one make off this? When can we go again?"

Linda responded like she did earlier, addressing each question in order giving out short answers. "Yes I'll tell you later, yes, you _do_ need a job, this was a particularly high leveled show: they range from 1-30, it was a combination of 3, it pays greatly depending on _if_ you win, they have a fight every week. Also, if you want a job, we can go right now to apply. All you're gonna need is some armour and a sword."

We went back to Linda's house, and she gave me a lapis sword. At the arena, we asked the manager if I could get a job there.

He heartily replied, "Aha! We were in need of a couple gladiators! Are you two a pair?"

I blushed and Linda quickly corrected him, "No, only he wants a job."

She elbowed me in the back and I replied, "Yes, only one job."

"Aye," The manager grunted, "so you want to take the test now, or prepare yourself first?"

"Now please."

He smiled in response and led me through the arena. "So, tell me about yourself," He sat me and Linda down in a dark, wooden room and took out a book and quill. "Where do you come from?"

I shared a look with Linda, and we silently agreed to lie. "I was spawned in Pastel City, right here."

Linda cover her laughter, and the manager wrote, "So you're from Earth?"

"Yes." I shamefully replied.

"People here don't, erm _spawn_. Anyway, next question. How much experience do you have and what is your prefered weapon?"

"I'd use a light sword and a heavy shield over anything else _any day_." I chose my words carefully to avoid anything that people _didn't_ commonly use in Minecraftia. "I prefer lapiz over any metal, and fight with a simple Sharpness IV, sometimes using Knockback II. I'm not very experienced in Minecraftia, but I was addicted to Minecraft on Earth. Thats not gonna get me anywhere here is it?"

"No, not really," The manager chuckled. "After the test, you'll be lucky to be put at level 2... As for the next question: would you prefer fighting against 1 person, against 2 people with one other person, against 2 mobs alone, or against a large number of mobs, with another person?"

"Uhh..." I thought.

"He'd like to fight against 1 other person." Linda hurriedly rushed.

I finished, "Hhhh... Yeah, that'd be great."

"Well, are you ready for the test? We have an enchanter here incase you want to enchant that rubbish sword of your's." The manager concluded.

Embarrassed, I smiled,"That would be great!"

Linda, who had some extra lapis on her crafted me a shield though many recipes, and we enchanted both of them together. She asked the enchanter, "What options do we have for the shield?"

He handed her a list that listed the options for enhancing a shield. It read:

Magnet

Turtle Formation

Sled

Absorb and Release

Awesome Bash

"Its a shame not many people use shields," He queried, "Notch would make more enchantments if only they were popular." Now _this_ one is for swords:

Strength in Numbers

Coliseum

Life Sap

Blood Thirsty

Creeper Repellent

Shield Growth

Pickpocket

Spear-Sized

"So, I take it you like shields...?" I guessed.

The man snappily replied, "Yes! Yes of course I do! I got 1 with every enchantment on it!"

"Impressive!" Linda humored.

"I'm also the tester for if you want to join the arena." The enchanter smiled with glee. "I reckon you want you stuff enchanted to try and fight me huh? I can do that for free."

I smiled, "Cool, so on my sword, can I have Sharpness IV, Knockback II, and also what does coliseum do?"

"Aye, coliseum summons blocks from below you too create a walled erm, coliseum for you to fight in."

"Also, is there a limit on enchantements?"

"Not if you, know who to talk too, and have a couple of extra diamonds laying around..." The enchanter slyly said.

"I'll take those ones please." I said, making it aware that I did _not _ have any diamonds laying around.

"And for your shield?"

"Turtle formation sounds pretty nice. I'll take that one. I suppose it makes the shield grow and surrounds you?"

"Yes! And would you like any other enchantments?"

"I'll take fire on the shield please."

The enchanter smirked, took my stuff, and gave them back, fully enchanted. "So, I take it you're the one fighting me later today? I wish you luck, you'll need it."

"Phew!" Linda said at last. "That took a while... Come to think of it," she looked at her watch,"It's just about night time! You'll be fighting with the mobs it seems." Linda laughed.

We went out to the interior of the arena, and Lind mentally prepared me for the fight. The manager came out and gave me some pre-chosen armour, as too the enchanter. It wasn't special, just leather.

The flags up top grew green, and the battle began. The enchanter jumped on his shield, slid towards me, jumped up and bashed me over the head. Ouch. I could hardly respond, but managed to meekly swing my sword. The enchanter blocked the impact, but was still knocked back. I regained my bearings and ran up to the enchanter. I pushed my sword to the ground, and blocks of sand in a circle around us arose. The enchanter's shield turned pink, so my efforts weren't affecting him at all. Remembering the list of shield enchantments, I quickly turtled, just as the he released. I felt huge amounts of force pulsing through the air particles, but most of the shock was absorbed by my turtle. I jumped up, and assaulted the enchanter once more. Knowing that he couldn't absorb again, I went all out. Unfortunately, this guy knew what he was doing. My coliseum dropped, and he bashed me with his shield again. It wasn't as hard as earlier, but the impact was still greatly felt in my arm. Without my arm, I couldn't use my sword, so I resorted to using my shield. Dropping my sword summoned the coliseum, so I dashed forward with no hesitation. Still, the enchanter was good. He jumped on his shield, and slid under me, knocking me over. Bashing me again, with a far greater force, I died.

I awoke in a dark room. There were only a couple torches, but I could still feel my way out through a crack of sunlight where the door lay. I opened it up with all my force to see the inside of the arena. My items at hand were scattered on the floor, a lapis pickaxe, my sword, and also my shield.

"So, did I get the job?" I hopefully asked.

The manager jumped down from the seats and said, "Yes, but you'll start at level 1." I frowned, then he quickly added, "It's better than nothing!" And at that, Linda and I wearily walked home, and I instantly passed out, without dinner.


End file.
